Stop Spending All Your Time on the Little Stuff.

This year is already moving pretty fast, therefore, your time management needs a quick pick me up.

If you’re ready to grow your business and generate sales you have to function in an environment that facilitates execution. I’ve accomplished the almost impossible in the last year with my new launch and brands.

How did I do it?

I Broke My Growth Barriers and Divided Up My Time.

If you’re ready to grow and need a little push, here are six broad categories to divide your time and what three activities you can start with. Other type of work can be added customized to your business:

Client Work – Clients or customers. This includes providing services and products to them.
• Follow Up to Questions, Requests, and Inquiries from Clients
• Update, Organize, and/or Finish Client Projects and Research
• Create Quarterly Communication Program for Announcements, Special Offers, and New Product Introductions
•
Administrative Work – This includes paperwork, phone calls, email, scheduling and other busy work to keep the business running.

I was chatting with one of my assistants about social media and marketing. We were talking about how many business owners are really achieving the success they proclaim or are they glorifying their success in order to get your business.

I know…a touchy yet intriguing topic.

We decided that a lot of people are selling dreams instead of reality whether they are online or offline, it doesn’t matter. Marketing 101 is about appealing to the needs and wants of your target market with emotional triggers, dynamic verbiage and subliminal messages. Here are a few things to watch out for when looking for resources, education, training, coaching, consulting, and everything in between to help you start, grow, and explode your small business:

In order to build the right small business infrastructure, you must think strategically – that’s having a business mindset. Here are seven examples of having a business mindset:

1. Having a business mindset is knowing that the purpose of business is to make money. Sometimes your hobby is just a hobby. Either you’re going to have a hobby that makes you a little extra money or you’re going to have a business that requires a higher level of development in order to acquire a higher level of income.

2. Having a business mindset means thinking for yourself vs. letting other people think for you. Don’t allow the experts to control your destiny or your dreams, let them help you get there. Take some time to think, document, research your own idea before asking for help – if you do – you will be better equipped to ask for exactly what you want and getting it.

3. Having a business mindset means being more strategic about your business activity. Don’t just go to any networking event or take on any job; know what results you want before you invest in business activity.

Learning how to create a realistic, strategic plan and then execute your plan (using goals) is the most important aspect of building a profitable business.

Instead of talking about how to set goals, I want to share with you 2 key elements needed in order to set and achieve your goals:

Element One: Vision
Let me ask you this question: When you get to where you’re going, where will you be?

For those of you who know me well, you've seen this question many times - my question to you is “have you answered it?”

If you don’t know where you’re going, you’ll get lost. In order to set goals you have to know where you want to go. Just like driving a car, if you don’t know the destination and you don’t have the directions, you’ll get lost; you’ll lose time, and money. So take the time to determine your vision.

I've made my share of stupid mistakes and will probably continue to do so. The difference is that I take the time to analyze and accept the fact that instant gratification (money) produces business headaches later most of the time.

Here's a summary of 10 stupid mistakes I've seen over the years:

1. Bartering for services/products that impact the bottom line. I’ve made this mistake more times that I care to admit. Bartering within small business is a standard practice, “I’ll provide 4 coaching sessions if you create a web site for me,” kind of deal. Although bartering can be good, it’s the wrong thing to do when the solution being exchanged and the solution being received has a direct impact on your cash flow. Why? 99% of the time both parties involved will not function at the level of expertise that both of you would function if this was a cash transaction.

Now that you know what transmogrification is and you’ve grasped the concept of a business mindset, now’s the time to engage in intangible activities that bring about tangible results.

You have to embrace the Intangibles of Business Development: Thinking, Reading, Writing, and Counting. Do I need to explain any further?

OK, a little…you have to think for yourself, you have to read not just skim, you have to write, and you have to know how to count. If you’re weak in any of these areas, stop blaming and get your skills up to par.

(I know intangible is boring but please keep reading)

When you think of an intangible result, your brain might freeze up so let’s start with some basic definitions from Webster’s dictionary:
• Thinking: the process of using your mind to consider something carefully.
• Reading: the cognitive process of understanding a written linguistic message.
• Writing: letters or symbols written or imprinted on a surface to represent the sounds or words of a language.
• Counting (mathematics): a science (or group of related sciences) dealing with the logic of quantity, shape and arrangement.

There are tons of resources out there that claim their process is easy or that their solution is easy to implement. Believe me some things are easy but be careful with wanting EVERYTHING to be easy. What am I referring to when I say EASY? Have you seen those office depot commercials with the big red easy button, you know-- it appears out of no where and you push it and every thing you need appears. Wow! What a concept, I only wish it were true for everyone when growing a business.

I run into a lot of entrepreneurs who get frustrated because they are drained, mentally tired, and wondering when the light in the dark tunnel will shine. “Why is this so hard, they say.” Believe me I wonder that sometimes myself. But, most of the time it’s only hard because we make it hard. The challenge comes when we want others to provide the easy button for us vs. creating our own beautiful red button by working smart – not hard.

Building and growing a business is not easy, but some of the activities we do to reach our vision can be easy. Here are some quick tips to create your own shiny red easy button without falling prey to the easy trap:

I’ve never been one to have a big ego, but lately I’ve been ego-surfing. If you use the Internet for business in any shape or form – I suggest you do the same.

Ego-surfing is the practice of searching one’s own name and company name on popular search engines. For example: I regularly search “Sherese Duncan” and “Effició.” I normally search on AltaVista, Google and HotBot.

Why should you ego-surf? With the influx of blogs, article directories, social web sites, networking web sites, etc., you have to ego-surf on a regular bases to first, make sure your efforts are paying off; second, make sure you’re not getting digitally diss’d over the Internet!

Do your friends surf the Net? Business colleagues? Your Family? Potential Clients?

Wouldn't you like to be aware of what they may be reading about 'you'?

Shouldn't you be aware if you are being libeled on your networking sites or forums you participate in?

How about if people are misquoting you or giving your articles bad reviews?

If you’re building and growing a business to provide for you for the rest of your life you have to make smart deals and seek strategic opportunities across international borders.

There is a distinct difference between those entrepreneurs who are business owners and those who are value innovators. To put it simply: To be an architect of growth and to excel under competitive pressures, entrepreneurs like you must adjust pricing, adapt to change, assimilate as needed, engage in strategic marketing, and foster innovation and value creation within your client base.

I know I’m getting a little deep here but it’s time to step up and do good business. Are you ready? Are you up to the task?

Alright then…Here are five ways to be an architect for growth the strategic way:

Let go of the employee mindset. I still revert back to my corporate days every now and then but I’m able to pinch myself and maintain my entrepreneurial style. The employee mindset works strict hours, normally nine to five, takes only two 10 minute breaks, possibly a half hour lunch, and is always looking for someone to tell them what to do.

Are you comfortable with your business? Too comfortable,
perhaps? Being comfortable is not a bad thing, but getting to a point of complacency, the ‘safe’ zone, can be your biggest trap. When you spend a lot of time avoiding work or you start getting bored, you may need a strategic jolt to ignite your drive.

Even the best businesses that seem like they have a secure
future can vanish in the abyss of unpredictable events. That’s why the best strategy is to recognize when you’re coasting and not driving. Here are the top 5 Warning Signs of business complacency:

1. You’ve lost your will to network. You don’t attend
networking activities as often or the ones you do attend don’t give the best results. You really know you’ve lost your
motivation to network when you don’t try to mingle and you don’t make any substantial contacts.

2. You haven’t updated your business skills in over a year.
Although I do have my degrees, I still engage in strategic
leaning and education to keep my skills in tact. And not just
subjects like marketing, sales, and strategy, but also economics and statistics. If you’re bored, take a class.

Can you really go it alone?

In order to run a business properly you need to understand what YOU can do vs. what you need to outsource. Doing everything yourself can be murder on your sanity and your revenues.

First you must analyze your skill set related to the nine key functions of business. The Key Functions of Business represent the different departments in a company. Every company has at least three of the nine key functions represented. Determining which functions are in your business helps set the framework for business development and analyzing which areas to outsource and which areas to keep in house.

The Nine Key Functions of Business:
• Accounting
• Distribution
• Production
• Marketing
• Human Resources
• Executive Team
• Administration
• Receiving
• Inventory

So why would a company want to outsource one of their key functions?
There are many reasons but the top two that I hear most often are you may not have have the expertise and/or you may not have the time to do it yourself and time is money.

It’s time to focus on Profitability and Increasing Cash Flow. Here are 10 quick tips to get you focused on both:

1. Spruce up Your Appearance – Dress to impress, eat right and stay healthy. If your appearance is top-notch then your confidence level goes up. Sometimes confidence can take you further than education, experience, or who you know. When you walk in the room, they will definitely know you!

2. Hire a Strategic Partner - In order to achieve the goals you set, you have to work with someone who you can trust, and feel comfortable with revealing all of your proprietary information to. Don’t just choose a strategic partner because a celebrity uses them or your best friend uses them - you want to work with someone who takes your business just as seriously as you do.

Your Business is the Ultimate System
by Sherese Duncan

Once the vision has been defined, you have to organize your business to function like a well oiled machine complete with all components working and evolving – A Small Business System™ - your Tangible Result.

Your working Small Business System™ will tell you…

• What to do with Your Skills
• What to do with Your Business
• What to do with Your Vision
• What to do with Your Money
• What to do with Your Marketing
• What to do with Your People
• What to do with Your Time

…for the life of your business not just right now! Your SBS™ will give you strategic direction and focus.

It’s about being fit, focused, disciplined, and organized – it’s all about the system baby!

Let’s break down some terminology that’s essential for understanding this concept:

What is a profitable business? A profitable business is where all monies coming in exceed all monies going out.

What is a cash-rich business? A cash-rich business has “liquid cash” in the bank to distribute as income, to invest back in the business, and to establish cash reserves for the business.